Opposition party Congress continues to target the government on the roll-out of the Goods and Service Tax (GST) in the country. Congress leader Kapil Sibal on Saturday took a jibe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government’s move to implement GST across the nation and claimed that what has been implemented is not a ‘good and simple tax’ as claimed by the PM, but ‘goodbye to a simple tax’. Sibal was quoted by Indian Express as saying that GST has hit businesses hard and because of which small and medium traders across the country were facing harassment. According to him, the new tax regime is only good for the government and bad for the simple man. Sibal said, “The prime minister said this is a good and simple tax, our take on that is that it is a goodbye to a simple tax,” as quoted by Indian Express.

He said private investment in India today was the lowest since 1992. While commenting on the provisions of the GST, Sibal explained that the situation is like if someone evades a tax on Rs 5 crore, it is a cognizable offence and between Rs 2 crore and Rs 5 Crore it is a non-cognizable offence and therefore every day Inspectors and Taxmen will chase people. He lashed out at the government and said, “You want people to do business or you want people to shut down business.”

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The country welcomed a new tax regime, Goods And Services Tax (GST) on the first of July this year. The tax reform that embodies the principle of “one nation, one tax, one market” concept, had its impact on various industries in India with four-tier GST structure with five, twelve, eighteen and twenty eight per cent tax rates.